Call Her Miss Masque...Call Her Masquerade!

Debuting in Exciting Comics #51, Miss Masque was another of the line of rich socialites-turned-masked crimefighters in the Golden Age which included The Shadow, The Batman, and The Green Hornet!
Diana Adams had no superpowers or abilities, just her keen deductive mind and a pair of .45 automatics. And, unlike her male contemporaries, she didn't have a sidekick or aides!
Clad in bright red cape, mini-dress, gloves, and slouch hat, she pursued criminals and saboteurs thru several issues of Exciting Comics, appearing on the cover only once (#53) during her run, before transferring over to America's Best Comics, where she teamed up (on the covers) with other heroes, most notably The Black Terror, even though they didn't appear together inside the comic! (They all had seperate strips!)

Also, she seemed to lose parts of her wardrobe when she changed homes, as her fedora disappeared along with the midriff of her costume (see left), making her predate the trailer-trash look of Britney Spears by decades! (Maybe it was her summer ensemble!)
When superheroes faded away after the end of World War II, so did Miss Masque.
Since the 1990s, she's been revived by several publishers, most notably, by writer Alan Moore of Watchmen fame in DC Comics' America's Best Comics imprint (ironic, eh?), and artist Alex Ross in Dynamite Entertainment's Project SuperPowers series as well as a mini-series under her new code-name of Masquerade!
In this revival, she's part of a trio of  psychically-linked, red-garbed superheroines (including The Woman in Red and Lady Satan) called The Scarlet Sisters!
We at Atomic Kommie Comics™ have also "revived" Miss Masque / Masquerade by digitally-restoring and remastering several of her best Golden Age cover appearances (including her first) on a line of t-shirts, mugs, and even calendars as part of our Lost Heroes of the Golden Age of Comics™ line of kool kollectibles!

She was a woman ahead of her time...but her time has finally come!

PS: Pick up the Project SuperPowers and Masquerade comics! They're the best Golden Age revival books out there!

Don't Call Her "GIRL Reporter"!

Jane Arden: Crime Reporter ran from 1927 to 1968, predating other female reporters like Brenda Starr: Reporter and Superman's Lois Lane by over a decade.
She's best-known as the FIRST American comic character to have a World War II-related storyline when her writers tossed out the strip's ongoing gangster plotline in a single daily strip and sent her to cover the warfront on September 25, 1939, less than a month after Germany invaded Poland!
Like most major 1930s-1950s comic characters, she was multi-media, with a radio show that ran for two years, a low-budget b-movie (that, while being pretty good, didn't do well enough to warrant a series) and comic books.
We at Atomic Kommie Comics™ feel that she deserves to return to the pop culture spotlight, so we've digitally-restored and remastered the best covers from her comic book run for a line of collectibles in our Heroines™ section for girls and women who want a strong, positive role model!
Have a look at Jane Arden: Crime Reporter, 'cause if you're doing something bad, she's looking for you!